Gerald Massey's Lectures - Society in evolution - Awardspace

looking like Seven great blazing mountains overthrown--the Seven mountains in
Revelation, on which the Scarlet Lady sits.
The Book of Genesis tells us nothing about the nature of the Elohim, erroneously
rendered God, who are the creators of the Hebrew beginning, and who are themselves
pre-extant and seated when the theatre opens and the curtain ascends. It says that in the
beginning the Elohim created the heaven and the earth. In thousands of books the Elohim
have been discussed, but with no application of the comparative process to this and the
earlier mythologies, and therefore with no conclusive result. Our bibliolators were too
conceited in their insular ignorance to think there was any thing worth knowing outside
of their own Books. Foolishly fancying they had gotten a revelation all to themselves, a
supernatural version of the cosmical Genesis, they did not care to seek for, did not dream
of, a natural or scientific Genesis, and could not make out the mythical; consequently
they have never known what it was they were called upon to worship in the name of God.
In his paper on the Evolution of Theology, Professor Huxley assumes that the Elohim of
Genesis originated as the ghosts of ancestors, in doing which he no more plumbs to the
bottom than does Mr. Gladstone. The Elohim are Seven in number, whether as nature
powers, gods of constellations, or planetary gods. Whereas the human ghosts are not, and
never were, a septenary, although they may be, and have been, confused with the typical
seven as the Pitris and Patriarchs, Manus and Fathers of earlier times. The Gnostics,
however, and the Jewish Kabalah preserve an account of the Elohim of Genesis by which
we are able to identify them with other forms of the seven primordial powers. They are
the children of the ancient Mother called Sophia. Their names are Ialdabaoth, Jehovah (or
Iao), Sabaoth, Adonai, Eloeus, Oreus and Astanphæus. Ialdabaoth signifies the Lord God
of the fathers; that is the fathers who preceded the Father; and thus the Seven are identical
with the Seven Pitris or Fathers in India. (Irenæus B.1, 30, 5.) Moreover, the Hebrew
Elohim were pre-extant by name and nature as Phoenician divinities or powers.
Sanchoniathon mentions them by name, and describes them as the Auxiliaries of Kronus
or Time. In this phase, then, the Elohim are timekeepers in heaven! In the Phoenician
Mythology the Elohim are the Seven sons of Sydik, identical with the Seven Kabiri, who
in Egypt are the Seven sons of Ptah, and the Seven spirits of Ra in the Book of the Dead;
in Britain, with the Seven Companions of Arthur in the Ark; in Polynesia, with the Seven
dwarf sons of Pinga; in America, with the Seven Hohgates; in India, with the Seven
Rishis; in Persia, with the Seven Amchaspands; in Assyria, with the Seven Lumazi.
They had one common genesis in phenomena, as I have traced them by number, by
nature, and by name; and also one common Kamite origin. They are always seven in
number as a companionship or brotherhood, who Kab, that is turn round together, whence
the 'Kab-ari.' The Egyptian Ali or Ari, gives us the root meaning; the Ari are the
companions, guardians and watchers, who turn round together. Hence the Aluheim or
Elohim. They are also the Ili or gods, in Assyrian, who were seven in number! Eight with
the Mother in the beginning, or the Manifestor in the end. In their primordial phase they
were seven elementary powers, warring in chaos, lawless and timeless. They were first
born of the Mother in space; and then the Seven Companions passed into the sphere of
time, as auxiliaries of Kronus, or Sons of the Male Parent. As Damascius says, in his
"Primitive Principles," the Magi consider that space and time were the source of all; and
from being powers of the air, the gods were promoted to become timekeepers for man.
Seven constellations were assigned to them, and so they could be called the auxiliaries of
Kronus, when time was established. As the seven turned round in the ark of the sphere
they were designated the Seven Sailors, Companions, Rishis, or Elohim. The first "Seven
Stars" are not planetary. They are the leading stars of seven constellations, which turned
round with the Great Bear in describing the circle of a year. These the Assyrians called
the seven Lumazi, or leaders of the flocks of stars, designated sheep. On the Hebrew line
of descent or development, these Elohim are identified for us by the Kabalists and